Flood Damage Cleanup Company

Midwest Hit by Strong Storms, Leaving Many Without Power

While people living in the Midwest were very relieved to get a break from the sweltering heat that sent thermometers soaring into the 90s, many are not so happy about waking up Saturday morning to find entire trees uprooted and snapped off in their yards. Severe thunderstorms rocked parts of the Great Lakes late Friday, resulting in downed trees and powerlines wherein around 150,000 were left in the dark.

In the Chicago area, thousands of homes and businesses remained in the dark Saturday in Chi Town’s northwest suburbs. Officials from Com Ed said that many people may not get their power back on until around dinnertime on Sunday. There were so many trees down in the Chicago area that Com Ed decided to send out additional tree crews.

A tornado packing 100 mile per hour winds struck Ursuline College in northeastern Ohio early Saturday, taking down a huge gymnasium wall at the school’s athletic building. The twister which was confirmed to be an EF1, hit just before 4 am north of the school and continued its journey across the campus. The tornado was about 150 yards wide and traveled on the ground for over 1.3 miles. Luckily there were only a handful of students on the campus at the time and none were in the vicinity of the athletic building. The same twister hit Pepper Pike before striking the college. Many residents of that community woke up to find trees laying in the yards. One unlucky family’s home sustained massive damage as a huge tree on their neighbor’s property crashed into their home, breaking the foundation and cracking walls.

In Mentor, Ohio near Cleveland, Saturday morning started with a slew of road closures across the city following a night of serious flooding. Many cars were left abandoned in Mentor, nearly fully submerged in water as the severe weather dumped a lot of rain over the area in a very short period of time. Officials in Mentor expect most of the city’s streets to be reopened by mid-afternoon Sunday as work crews worked overnight to clear.

Police in Mentor were discouraging residents from traveling and said that if people had to travel that they’d have to find alternate routes and proceed with extreme caution as many of the city’s streets were covered with water.